15 statistics that show why email marketing is important

Is email marketing dying? We don’t think so. Seeing constant user base growth, we expect email marketing to not only remain important, but also to thrive. We collected and categorized some email marketing statistics proving just that so that you can make informed decisions when planning this year’s marketing strategy.

Potential reach is growing

Approximately half the world’s population uses email in 2017

The number of business & consumer emails that are sent & received each day is expected to reach 319.6 billion by the end of 2021, that’s over 116 trillion emails a year!

In 2017 we reached 3.7 billion active email users

Gmail alone has 1.2 billion users

The industry expects 4.1 billion active email users worldwide in 2021

In the US, 90% of adults use email

On an average, consumers will have about 1.86 email accounts per person by 2021

Email marketing statistics

In the opinion of professionals, email marketing is important

90% of marketers say email marketing is “important” or “very important” for their organization.

25% of B2B marketers and 35% of B2C marketers say email marketing is best used for retention.

Customers like communicating with brands via email

81% of online shoppers who receive product recommendations by email based on their previous shopping habits, consider themselves likely to return to the website and make a purchase again (learn more about this in our free 2018 Trendbook).

Around 50% of customers say they like receiving discounts, 38% say they like loyalty program rewards and free delivery, 43% like free samples and gifts, 23% like competitions and advance notice of new products.

Email marketing simply works

Email marketing has a return on investment (ROI) of around 4300%.

Respondents to a survey conducted by eMarketer, indicated that email alone accounted for revenues equal to all other types of digital advertising combined.

Welcome emails generate 4x more opens and 5x more clicks than regular email marketing campaigns (learn more about this in our free 2018 Trendbook).

Rakuten Marketing, a Japanese eCommerce company, reported that during the Thanksgiving Week of 2017, click-through rates had risen by 154% from the previous year.

Why are these statistics important?

A growing user base means more potential clients. Despite popular belief, not everyone is on social media, but having an email address nowadays is a necessity, as proved by the growing ratio of accounts per user. One email address is often not enough – we have separate addresses for private and professional purposes.

The overwhelming majority of marketers judge email marketing as important. They also report that the highest revenues come from email marketing.

What’s more, customers like email marketing when it is useful, personalized, and relevant to their needs.

Leverage email in your marketing strategy accordingly and you could see your business grow.